What the tobacco companies don’t want you to know:

If you met Sir Walter Raleigh now and he said, ‘I’ve got this great new fun stick that contains road-covering chemicals, varnish, strong detergents, bits of metal, stuff you pickle body parts in and, oh yes, waste products of mammals. You can be hooked in seconds and after a lifetime of smoking you can make yourself poor, ill, dead or disabled.’ What would your reply be? Yet this is exactly what smoking entails.

Tobacco smoke contains over 4,000 different substances. They are added for many reason reasons – from improving the taste and smell, to making the product grow. Some are absorbed in the planting and growing stages or, in the case of substances like ammonia, are added to make you absorb nicotine quicker and get more hooked even in the low nicotine brands.

The chemicals that are found in cigarettes:

• Acetone – Nail varnish remover.
• Ammonia – A heavy duty disinfectant.
• Arsenic – A poison used in insecticides.
• Benzene – A solvent found in many chemicals and petrol fuel.
• Butane – Lighter fuel.
• Cadnium – A poisonous metal found in batteries.
• Carbon monoxide – This sticks to red blood cells, reducing the ability to carry oxygen around the body. It changes the shape (and oxygen-carrying capabilities) of the red blood cells and makes them sticky, leading to a greater chance of blocked arteries.
• Cresol – Found in disinfectants, photographic processing compounds and fence paint.
• Formaldehyde – Found in hospitals and laboratories for preserving bodies.
• Hydrogen cyanide – A deadly poison.
• Lead – A harmful substance found in old pipes and roof tiles.
• Magnesium – An element and a compound found in alloy car wheels. 
• Nicotine – The addictive component, not known to be cancer-causing but also used as an insecticide.
• Polonium 210 – A radioactive substance that reportedly killed a Russian in London a few years ago.
• Radon – Another radioactive substance.
• Shellac – A sweet-smelling substance found in varnish. 
• Sulphuric acid – A strong cleaning acid.
• Tar – Like the road covering. This narrows the lung airways and causes coughing and cancer.
• Urea – A human, (or animal), waste product.

But we know all that. The health issues have been well publicised and in truth rarely motivate on their own. That’s why it is important to look for other reasons that motivate you as well as health. Hopefully when you stop, your health will sort itself out in time.
It is really easy to stop smoking. It is staying stopped that’s the hard part.
We can all stop something for a minute, an hour, a day, but real change only comes when behaviour and thinking is also changed.

Extract taken from Stop Smoking – The Essential Guide by Simon Daubney. For more information on the chemicals in a cigarette and how to stop smoking, take a look at the book - available now in printed and eBook format. By the printed version and get the eBook free!